


Regeneration Gap

by ellerkay



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-09
Updated: 2015-08-09
Packaged: 2018-04-13 20:25:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4536132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellerkay/pseuds/ellerkay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One and Eleven meet. It’s like when Ten and Five met, only more so.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Regeneration Gap

**Author's Note:**

> Set just before the beginning of the series, and between seasons five and six of new Who. Also, I have no evidence that One ever actually carried a cane. But it was necessary.

It was around a corner in ancient Egypt (he thought it would be funny to wave at Amy and Rory from a roll of papyrus) that the Doctor ran into himself.  
  
“Do watch where you’re going,” grumbled One, white-haired and walking with a cane.  
  
“Oh, it’s you!” Eleven exclaimed, delighted. “I really should go, of course, this could be dangerous.” He took a half-step away and then immediately bounced back. “All right, you’ve convinced me. I’ll stay, but only for a couple minutes. Just for nostalgic purposes.”  
  
“Do I know you?” One asked, frowning.  
  
“Know me! That’s not the point at all. What’s important is that I know you. I can’t believe I’d forgotten about this. It’s much more fun this time around.” He stared intently into One’s face. “You’re so _old_!”  
  
One glared at him. “Excuse me, but I must be going. I don’t have time for rude madmen.” He started to walk on, and Eleven’s grin widened.  
  
“And grumpy! Old and grumpy.”  
  
One didn’t look back.  
  
“Tell me, Doctor, what are you carrying that cane for?” Eleven called. One stopped. “You can’t tell me the rheumatism’s bothering you, not in this dry heat. You just think it looks _cool_.” He fingered his bowtie while One turned slowly around.  
  
“Corsair?” he asked. Eleven rubbed his hands together.  
  
“No! But close, very close. Sort of very close, in that way where you’re not really close at all.” He stepped up to One, smiling. “Don’t tell me you don’t recognize me. Don’t tell me you don’t recognize… _you_.”  
  
One’s eyes widened and he took a step backwards. “No,” he whispered.  
  
“Yes!” Eleven exclaimed happily. “Ten bodies on! It’s me!” He pointed at One. “You!”  
  
“Ten regenerations?” One said. “How old are – you?”  
  
Eleven shrugged. “Nine hundred, ish,” he said. One frowned disapprovingly.  
  
“You went through ten bodies in five hundred years?”  
  
“Well, so will you,” Eleven protested. “Besides, it could have been longer. I don’t know how old I am! You try counting age with any consistency when you’re mucking about all over space and time. What am I supposed to do, tot up all my hours?”  
  
“I do,” One pointed out.  
  
“Oh, yeah. Forgot about that.” Eleven frowned. “Look, things get in the way! Important things. Fun things. There’s better stuff to do than addition!”  
  
One began walking forward, and Eleven, with a panicked look, backed up.  
  
“No, no,” he protested. “Okay, I remember why the cane now, you don’t have to – ” One rapped him sharply on the top of his head with the cane.  
  
“Ow!” Eleven shouted, rubbing his head. “Why would you do that?”  
  
“Clearly, someone needs to knock some sense into me,” One said loftily. “And who better to do it than myself?”  
  
“You should show some respect for your elders,” Eleven said. One whacked him again. “OW! Listen, believe me when I say you’re going to regret that!”  
  
“It was worth it,” One replied.  
  
“I had forgotten how selfish you are,” Eleven said, looking a little angry now. “You think you know everything, but you don’t know anything. And you’ve got no compassion, and no idea what – ” He stopped. One was trying not to show it, but Eleven knew with certainty he was hurt.  
  
Eleven sighed. “You’re so young, old man,” he said ruefully. “Where’s Susan?”  
  
“In the marketplace,” One answered. “I was just going to find her.”  
  
“Keep her safe for me,” Eleven said. A shadow crossed his face. “You may not always be able to.”  
  
“Do you want to see her?” One asked. “It could be a good lesson for her.”  
  
“Lesson?”  
  
“About the perils of crossing your own time stream.” One was smiling a little now, and Eleven smiled back.  
  
“You mean this bump on my head?” His grin faded. “I wish I could, but…better not.” He glanced around. “I should go.”  
  
One nodded, and started to walk away.  
  
“Doctor,” Eleven called. One turned around again.  
  
“You know how Susan’s always nattering on about wanting to go to school on Earth? England, in the 1960’s?”  
  
One folded his arms. “Of course I do,” he said crossly. “She never seems to talk about anything else, no matter what places and times I show her. I simply cannot see how one little backwater planet could have caught her imagination like this. And the humans! Those silly apes – ”  
  
“Let her go,” Eleven cut in. “It’s important.”  
  
One harrumphed. “Let her go! But it’s the most foolish – ” He caught Eleven’s look and nodded slowly. “All right then, if you say so. Good day, Doctor.”  
  
“Take care of yourself.”  
  
Eleven watched him walk off, and then went back to the TARDIS. He fiddled with a couple controls, so he had something to do with his hands.  
  
“Was I really that grumpy, sexy?” he asked out loud. She didn’t answer – she never did – but Eleven smiled anyway, and spun the controls in earnest this time, and they were off again.


End file.
